The Natural Light Portrait Workshop is a fun and informative 3-hour class, which we conduct out of our home base Gallery in the Pruneyard shopping center.

Beginning each session with introductions, in order to get familiar with everyone, their gear, and most importantly their reasons for taking the class.

We have the choice of a morning or afternoon session. Both get underway with a brief presentation of the basics of using your DSLR. We discussed the exposure triangle – aperture, shutter speed, ISO as well as the additional element of exposure compensation.

We also discussed some of the compositional basics, and why they work to create compelling images. After Ellie was done with the technical and creative review, the workshop continued to the exciting part – shooting portraits outdoors in the Pruneyard complex.

The weather was great and very convenient as we stopped at different areas. Our two models, Sonja and Ilana, provided a good opportunity to practice on how to position subjects according to the quality of light and background. A major discussion was how to control depth of field via aperture – keeping what is essential in focus. This helped either eliminate busy backgrounds or make interesting backgrounds just as important to the image.

We also tried to see the power of our cameras by raising the ISO and exposure compensation to help light our subjects when they are backlit. Most importantly, we learned that there are simple techniques in controlling light – backlighting our subjects (with the sun behind their heads) to provide an even light on their face and a cool hair light as well as using a 5-in-1 reflector to either fill our subject’s faces or diffuse light from the sun for a nice, soft glow.

It was a fun and informative workshop which Ellie and Danielle were happy to share with the students!

Thank you and Happy Snapping from Ellie, Danielle, and the entire Aperture Academy Team!